Tip: iPhoto ’11 Magnification Shortcuts

Editing photos can be tricky, especially if you’re not a professional. Sometimes you need to magnify your pictures to edit them, like when trying to fix annoying red eye. Here are a few shortcuts to make zooming in and out of pictures easier and faster when using iPhoto ’11.

The way most people zoom in and out of pictures when editing in iPhoto is by using the Zoom slider at the bottom of the window with the Navigation panel to look at different parts of the picture up close. But these keyboard shortcuts are even easier than that.

To zoom in to a picture, double click on an image from your library to view it solo then place your cursor on the part of the picture that you want to see magnified (like in the picture shown above). Then:

  • Press 1 to magnify the image by 100 percent, which will center your zoom where your cursor was.
  • Press 2 to magnify by 200 percent.
  • To exit the magnification mode, use the Zoom slider at the bottom or just tap 0 or Z to return to normal size.

If your cursor is not hovering over your image when you press 1 or 2, iPhoto will zoom to the exact center of your picture, which is pretty handy in itself.

These same shortcuts can also be used in other areas of iPhoto as well. For instance, press 0, 1, or 2 to quickly change how large your thumbnails appear in Events or Photos view. 0 makes the thumbnails as small as possible, 1 makes them as big as possible, and 2 puts them somewhere in between.

And there you have it! Happy zooming.

Source and Image Credit: The Mac Observer

Kaylie lives in Ottawa and got her first Mac in 2007 and is now a fan for life.